


Ten Years

by CerseiSassQueen



Series: The Stag King, the Rose Queen, and the She-Wolf [3]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Feels, Arranged Marriage, Babies, Blood and Injury, Character Study, Childbirth, Difficult Decisions, Drabble Sequence, Dysfunctional Family, F/M, Feelings, First Time, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, Multi, OT3, Other, POV Female Character, Parenthood, Penis In Vagina Sex, Polyamory, Pregnancy, Public Display of Affection, Robert Lives, Rule 63, Wedding Night
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-27
Updated: 2019-04-27
Packaged: 2020-01-01 05:12:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18329315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CerseiSassQueen/pseuds/CerseiSassQueen
Summary: Three scenes from a royal marriage, over ten years, from Margaery's POV; past, present, and future.{Multichapter, WIP}.AU, established relationships;Robert/MargaeryRobert/fem!Jon (mentioned)Robert/Margaery/fem!Jon (implied)





	Ten Years

**Author's Note:**

> Past: In which the Stag King weds his fresh Rose bride.

**Past**

Margaery Tyrell rides into King’s Landing like a conqueror of old, every inch a queen-to-be in her gown of evergreen silk and gold-leaf brocade, a crown of summer roses set atop her loose honeyed curls, her dove-soft fingers gloved in kidskin and lace, light and delicate against the reins. The dappled-grey stallion is lively beneath the saddle, excited by the heady atmosphere and irritated by the heat-flies and the jostling host around them, dancing and sidestepping like a Braavosi swordsman, but he is receptive to her touch and she brings him to heel with a firm hand as the city walls loom into sight. Above the gate, the head of her predecessor watches the merry procession, spiked and sightless, those darkened eye-sockets hollow and oblivious but nonetheless exuding baleful energy and loathing..and perhaps a warning, from one queen to another, from the lioness to the rose. Margaery pays it no mind, gently squeezing her thighs around the stallion’s mighty rib-cage and drumming the heels of her dainty leather boots against his sides, her laughter tinkling like silver bells as she spurs him into a prancing canter and rides through the gate ahead of her guards. Willas calls out her name, chiding his sister for her impatience as he urges his chestnut mare forward to catch up, but his protests are half-hearted, lost to the welcoming din of the city unfurling around them.

 _I shall be riding a stag soon enough_ , Margaery thinks, her brown eyes hooded, a wry and decidedly wicked smile tugging at those pretty rosebud lips; one can only hope that her fresh mount will prove as pleasant and tractable as the stallion when she finally climbs into that lofty saddle. She doubts it, but Olenna Tyrell’s granddaughter will not shy from her duty, and she feels as strong and bold as Queen Nymeria herself in this moment, with the stinking city emptying into the streets to meet this new conqueror, crying her name and blessing her House, with her handsome gold-green brothers as her sentries and the glory of the Reach at her back.

Much later, Margaery tries to hold the fragile memory of that same feeling when she is borne aloft in the grasp of many greedy hands, carried from the feasting hall like a tiny boat caught in the swollen tide of a storm at sea, with a drunken hoard of noblemen as the waves to her imperilled vessel. They are as rough and bawdy with their queen as with any other young bride, tearing strips from her cloth-of-gold gown as trophies, singing loud enough to drown out the musicians and the giggling shrieks of their womenfolk as they rush to attend their king, her lord husband. She can hear Robert’s easy laughter, his deep baritone bellowing out the final verse of _The Queen Took Off Her Sandal and the King Took Off His Crown_ , and then...oh, and then she is alone, perched in the centre of the bed, small and soft in the dim candlelight, her gown reduced to rich rags and her carefully arranged hair now rumpled beyond saving. She looks up at the immense red-gold tapestry covering the length and breadth of the opposite wall, an intricately woven hunting scene with the central panel showing a small gathering of hunters surrounding a young white-flanked deer, goading their prey with hounds and long spears. Here and now, Margaery feels a certain kinship with the distressed beast, a rose by birth and breeding but a doe by marriage, after shedding her Tyrell maidenhood in the great Sept for her husband’s stag cloak; her heart is fluttering and pounding fit to burst, as though she is living out that scene for true, fleeing those pointed spears and baying hounds, running for her life with the huntsmen at her heels.

It is not the pain of the marriage bed she fears, if this sudden bout of nervous energy can be described as fear at all. The pink-blushed rose of Highgarden had been plucked by a pretty young retainer scarcely a year before the former queen lost her golden head, and she had lain with him half a dozen times at her leisure before she found her true mark, notched like a fine slender arrow at her grandmother’s bow and let fly with precise aim, with the royal standard as their target. Her first lover had been summarily dispatched, killed by a fall from his horse during a hunt, or so they said, and she did not mourn the loss, her heart hardened to such needful sacrifices. After all, men were given to boast in their cups, and her family could not risk their future to the trust of a loose-tongued green boy, a cock crowing in a smoky tavern of his easy youthful conquest of the future queen. At any rate, Margaery had gamely suffered the customary examination of her person at the gnarled hands of the Grand Maester himself, with several high lords and septons in attendance, and the apparent lack of a maidenhead had not hampered her progress. The prospective royal bride was, according to Pycelle’s fawning judgement, a paragon of virtue, as tight and untouched as a fresh flowering bud, and the absence of blood in the marriage bed would be easily waved away as evidence of her passion for riding and hunting; after all, it is a sensible and readily accepted truth that many a young noblewoman is more likely to lose her maidenhood on horseback than in her husband’s arms. If he was disappointed by the report, if he felt cheated at the loss of that singular pleasure, his dreams of bathing his cock in virgin blood dashed by the maester’s verdict, Robert did not show it, choosing instead to express his admiration for Margaery’s exuberance, for his future wife’s prowess in the saddle. Aye, his long-lost Lyanna had been much the same, he was heard to muse, his eyes mournfully soft and distant as he remembered that wild northern beauty, half-wolf and half-horse, a centauress galloping through his memories.

As to her nerves, Margaery can only presume that it is natural to feel so shaken and highly strung in the face of victory, when she is so very close to triumph that she can almost taste the bittersweet sting of it, her entire life shrinking to this moment, one step nearer the completion of her sole purpose in this world; to marry a king and breed his children in her womb, to bring honour and glory to her family name, to survive and grow, to thrive and _win_. But there is no time to dwell on such things, not now, and the anticipatory silence of the room is soon broken when the door swings open, the king’s arrival heralded by ribald laughter and the muted strains of music from the great hall. She is ready with a smile when the merry procession of giggling noblewomen fades into the background, the door closing once again and sealing her within the tomb-like quiet of the room with her husband, and she speaks to break the silence, her voice carefully demure and without its familiar birdsong lilt as he approaches the bed where she waits for him, “Your Grace.” It is a rare misstep on her part and she realises the error of her words almost immediately, feeling a little twinge of genuine fear needling at her breast when Robert’s bluff features darken to an apoplectic shade above the coarse brush of his beard, his eyes flint and steel where before they had twinkled with boyish merriment. Wrongfooted and reluctant to scrabble for his favour, Margaery twines her pale arms around herself in a show of demure fragility, playing the wilting rose in the hope that she might be spared his ire, if it comes. Whatever the man is, however gross and swollen with slothful self-indulgence he has become, so far removed from his youthful glory as to be unrecognisable as the bane of House Targaryen, she can sense the dormant power in his form, and she needs no whispering spider to relay rumours to her delicate ear on that score. Enough loose-lipped courtiers have witnessed the king’s temper for it to be common knowledge, and Margaery had been duly warned by wily tongues that even the former queen had felt the back of his hand on more than one occasion, long before the truth of Cersei’s incestuous predilections was revealed to the world. Margaery does her very best not to flinch when a huge meaty hand curls around her jaw, coaxing her chin to tilt, her eyes huge and dark in the pale heart of her face, and whatever truth Robert thinks to find in her doe-brown gaze seems to soften him, until she fancies that she can see the shadow of the boy he had once been, before war and tragedy killed him and made this man in his stead. _He is a shrewder beast than I gave him credit for_ , she realises, _and he does not want my false grace._

“My brother thinks that I am a fool.” Robert’s voice is steady and pensive, remarkably so, considering he had drank enough wine to fell an ox during their wedding feast, “Stannis has never forgiven House Tyrell for laying siege to Storm’s End, but he is wise enough to advice me without allowing past grudges to cloud his judgement...and he thinks that I would have done far better to marry into a family with less ambition than yours, that I have been blinded by coin and clever words...and the promise of a pretty young bride in my bed.” A hundred careful protests flood into Margaery’s mind, salty-sweet and sharp in her defence of her family name, but Robert’s thick fingers find her lips before she can speak, tracing the comely shape of her mouth, the calloused pads rough but not altogether unpleasant against her tender skin. He shakes his head, drawing his thumb over her plump lower lip, pressing hard and firm until the pillowy flesh gives to his touch, parting to reveal the gleam of small white teeth inside. Margaery shivers, feeling more like a horse than a queen, as though she is a young filly in a livestock pen at the fair, allowing herself to be poked and prodded, to have her teeth examined by a prospective buyer. The tip of her tongue dips against Robert’s thumb, pink and kittenish, and his blue eyes flash with a sudden heat as she probes a wet stripe over his digit, from the tip to the inner crease of his second knuckle, before pulling back from his hand with an impish wrinkle of her pert nose. She wonders if perhaps she should play the blushing maiden, if only to avoid suspicion as to her innocence, but Robert is more receptive to the mischievous glint in her eyes than to her earlier show of respectful modesty, and she wants to push her advantage now, to endear herself to him and sow the seeds of a strong alliance in their marriage bed. Her husband is a stranger, in truth, but he is only a man, even with the weight of the crown upon his brow...and she _knows_ men, she understands their base needs and desires, their childish vanities and petty cruelties, the lessons heeded at her grandmother's knee giving her a firm foothold in this unfamiliar territory. Her soft dainty fingers curl over his forearm, stroking against the livid blue veins which map the insides of his thick wrist, and the king looks at his bride as though he has already had her three times over, in every possible way, as though he knows _exactly_ how she looks and feels without the silk-shade of her gown to veil the pale sunlight of her skin from his eyes.

When Robert speaks again, his voice is rough, edged with a raw desire, and he reaches up to sink his fingers into her loose curls, gently coaxing her head back to meet her eyes, “My Hand is of much the same opinion as my brother, I fear…” Margaery feels naked as a babe in the ragged remnants of her wedding finery, soft and vulnerable, the hunted hart standing its ground on trembling limbs before the slavering hounds, but she meets his gaze without hesitation, leaning into his touch and offering a faint smile to appease him, “Lord Stark does not approve of me? Oh, it saddens my heart that such a fine and honourable man should find me at fault, although I cannot imagine what I could have done to garner his reproach.” A lie, of course, but a sweet and well-meaning one, and Robert lets out a knowing chuckle at her guileless expression, his fingers tugging playfully against her curls as he confirms her suspicions, “Ned would have preferred me to look beyond the charms of Highgarden for a bride. _Choose a peahen this time_ , he said, _rather than a bird of paradise_. I love the man like a brother and cherish his counsel, but he is more like Jon Arryn with each passing year, gods rest him. Nagging, stiff-necked old fussbodies, the pair of them.”

Ah, so that was the reason for Eddard Stark’s coolness towards the newly crowned queen. Once bitten, twice shy, as they say, and the northman is nothing if not a careful man. Aye, he had wanted a peahen for Robert, a drab little thing with a meek heart, a fertile womb, and nothing but dull loyalty in her mind. Plain and decidedly unambitious, and therefore unlikely to give her husband a pair of horns to wear along with his crown. Given the considerable trouble caused by the Lannister woman and her kingslaying twin, Lord Stark’s reticence is understandable really, if not appreciated on Margaery’s part. Of course, she does not flatter herself that she was chosen for any reason other than the Crown's need for her father's coffers, with the old lion of the Rock licking his wounds and the Iron Bank of Braavos sniffing for coin. It is only a stroke of good fortune for the king that Mace Tyrell's only daughter also happens to be one of the celebrated beauties of the realm, or so she has heard herself described...but looks aside, her coronation was assured from the moment her predecessor fell from grace, even if she had been as homely and oafish as her lord father, rather than a renowned beauty. Still, Lord Stark is the Hand of the King, and she silently vows to win his favour, to befriend his pretty daughters and give him no reason to suspect that she is anything other than a docile broodmare, a sweet little bird just as he had hoped, albeit with brighter feathers that he might have bargained for.

“You are fortunate to have such loyal and wise advisors, Your Grace... _Robert_. I only hope that I can prove myself worthy of their good opinion, in time...and of yours...” She musters a pretty blush for him now, the very picture of wholesome maidenhood, even as her clever mind turns to decidedly _unwholesome_ thoughts in order to manage the effect, quickening her pulse and sending a rush of fresh blood to her face. She remembers the tight press of taut youthful skin against her own bare flesh, pictures dappled sunlight on sinewy muscles and the gleam of beaded sweat. She does _not_ think of Cersei, of that once-golden head rotting above the city gates. Nor does she think of what is to come, of her husband’s aging bulk, of his ungainly weight bisecting her downy thighs as he spreads her open for his kingly cock. _It matters not. I am the queen_ , she reminds herself, _I was made for this, born and bred for it. I will endure it. I will do my duty and take my due._

Robert is pleased by her words, by the way his name rolls from her tongue like warm honey, and he drops both hands to her hips now, squeezing her pliant flesh with battle-hardened fingers, “You will be a good wife.” His touch is firm and encouraging against her skin, but his voice gives the lie to his easy confidence, colouring his words with uncertainty; you _will_ be a good wife...was that a command? Or a question, perhaps?

 _A plea_ , Margaery thinks, repressing the sharp tilt of a smile and allowing herself a breathless sigh in its place, as she sinks down into the soft cradle of the mattress and opens her limbs to welcome her husband. He has twice now married women whom he has no cause or desire to love, his heart buried in the cold crypts beneath Winterfell with the wolf-girl and her crown of blue roses...but Margaery is no less a rose than Lyanna Stark. She is the Rose Queen, the herald of summer, and she wears a crown of gold.

_Gold cannot wither or wilt, and nor will she, even if she has to swallow her thorny pride to grow strong and supplant the ghosts of that fateful false spring._


End file.
